Shaul Schwarz: Music, Guns and Drugs in the film ‘Narco Cultura’

How do you make a documentary about violent drug culture without getting yourself killed? The answer is: with a lot of patience, intimacy, and trust.

Last week week I spoke with photographer and filmmaker Shaul Schwarz about his new documentary Narco Cultura. The film examines the grim reality of the violent drug war in Mexico, as well as the glorification of that lifestyle in a popular form of music called “narcocorridos.”

Schwarz was originally inspired to make the film while working on a 2010 National Geographic story called Troubled Saints that profiled narco culture, as well as the rising dedication to various folk icons of death. (Photos from that story are seen in this post.)

Los Angeles-based narcocorrido group ‘BuKnas de Culiacan Sinaloa’ plays at club El Centenario, a popular Mexican hangout in Moreno Valley, Calif., on Oct. 23, 2009.

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While working on that assignment, Schwarz spent a surreal day covering two murders in Tijuana, then drove straight to a club in Riverside, Calif., to photograph the musicians of the narcocorrido band “BuKnas de Culiacan Sinaloa.” He was still covered in blood.

The bizarre collision of witnessing actual violence, paired with people celebrating killing in the music of the narcocorridos, totally jarred him. It was at that moment he decided to make the film.

“I had been focusing on the violence, and I saw how it affected so many people in so many ways,” said Schwarz. “It really haunted me, but it didn’t really live in the photographs—I realized it wasn’t a story that could be told in pictures.”

A crime scene investigation of two dead bodies found in the desert outside of Juarez. Mexico, on Aug. 2, 2009.

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The film follows two main characters: Edgar Quintero, the singer of the narcocorrido band “BuKnas” from Los Angeles, and Richie Soto, a crime scene investigator in Juarez, Mexico. It cuts back and forth between the two, allowing viewers to experience the surreal dichotomy between the shell-shocked residents of Mexico, and the club-goers who shake, dance, and sing to the deceptively cheerful narcocorridos.

(One typically upbeat song’s lyrics are: “With an AK-47 and a Bazooka on my shoulder, cross my path and I’ll chop your head off. We’re bloodthirsty, crazy, and we like to kill.” The music has been banned from the radio in Mexico.)

The scene where a body was found in Juarez, Mexico, on Aug. 2, 2009.

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Schwarz, originally from Israel, spent three years traveling from his home in Brooklyn to Mexico and Los Angeles to gain the trust of his subjects, allowing them to slowly open up to him over time. It gave him access into a world that few journalists infiltrate because of the inherent danger involved.

“I looked at a lot of documentaries that were made about the drug war, and it was always talking heads, it wasn’t photojournalistic—I wanted it to feel real,” said Schwarz. “This war is a little bit scary, it’s not like Israel or Afghanistan. The narcos are everywhere but they are nowhere.”

A women puts down flour to soak up blood on the pavement where a young man was murdered August 6, 2009, in Ciudad Juarez.

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To make the film as raw and real as possible, Schwarz said he pushed Edgar and Richie to allow him to document intimate moments of their lives, even if it meant showing illegal activity or gruesome scenes of death.

“At first Edgar said, ‘Are you out of your mind?’” said Schwarz. “But then I spent three years flying in and out of his life. We had a growing trust, and as he saw me more, he would slip and let me shoot stuff. Also, I began to understand him, not judge him. I saw he was a good father, and I saw that this music kept him out of prison himself. I didn’t want to make a movie that hangs my protagonist, and I think he felt that.”

Schwarz and his soundperson, Juan Bertran, eventually filmed Edgar with guns, drugs, and on a mad trip through Culiacan, Mexico, where he partied with, and performed for, narco gangsters.

Groupies of the narcocorrido band ‘Northern Fusion,’ hang around J.C. Recording Studios near the center of Culiacan, Sinaloa, on Oct. 17, 2009.

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The filmmakers also documented Richie as he recovered bodies from crime scenes, and interviewed him about his career, even as he faced the real risk of being executed himself for saying too much.

“In Juarez, the SEMEFO [Forensic Medical Service where Richie works] really respected me as not just another journalist who comes just for the day—there was a ‘brothers in arms’ feel about it,” said Schwarz. “We made almost 20 trips to Juarez—we got a lot of trust there. And what was clear is that you can get killed for just knowing stuff, so we quickly understood that we wanted good access, but we weren’t going to ask too many questions. We would get ourselves, or Richie killed.”

“I told Juan and my producers, ‘This is not an investigative piece, this is about getting the people in the U.S. to feel what it feels like across the border,” he continued. “I wanted the cuts between the worlds to feel like the moment I felt that night at the club.”

Federal police conduct a raid inside a large dance club in downtown Tijuana, on June 12, 2009.

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Schwarz was able to make such an intimate film because he operated on a small scale—using minimal gear, and minimal people (just himself as videographer and Bertan as soundperson and translator.) And because of Schwarz’s background as a photojournalist, his instinct was to get as close as possible to his subjects.

“The access and trust we had was really was the DNA of the movie,” said Schwarz. “We want to set examples for photojournalists who are getting into film, because the one thing I think we [photojournalists] have is the ability to go further, to be raw, to put ourselves in harms way.”

A young man is found shot to death in a residential neighborhood in Palomas, Mexico, on August 3, 2009.

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Most importantly, Schwarz says he wants viewers to come away with the understanding that the drug war is not just confined to Mexico, but that it’s an American problem as well.

“We are so accepting of this war which is not that far away, we are really a part of it,” he said. “While the movie is not political, I hope that it makes people feel like we can’t live with the status quo. I don’t want people to just sweep it under the table–lets talk about it.”

Narco luxury is reflected at the “Jardines de Humaya” cemetery in Culiacan, Sinaloa, where domed mausoleums are erected for drug war victims.

There are 11 Comments. Add Yours.

Joan
November 29, 2014

This is so sad. A lot of people have given up! One of the solutions is to legalize marijuana… That will cut deep into the drugs trade profits and bring it out of the shadows. But the film and the situation, and the society are sick and sickening! I hope they bring about change!

yvonne molina
January 9, 2014

hope it raises awareness i live by the border of mexico and it pains me to see them doing this to themselves and to others

irajbashokat
December 27, 2013

nice pictures

umairbhat
December 22, 2013

hard to desrve

Minette
December 22, 2013

It’s all about trust, know what u want and focus. I would like 2c the film. It couldn’t been easy, a job well done under the utmost difficult circumstances. I do admire and respect for your valuable input and efford!

Sean S
December 21, 2013

Reminds me of a (creepy) evolutionary development from my years growing up as a teen in the environ of the 1980’s Cocaine Cowboys in south Miami

Anny Kusuma
December 21, 2013

I would like to see all that feel and i do believe all that great..

Khan
December 21, 2013

It is alarming that most politicians are starting to have us believe that liberalising use of narcotics will reduce related crime which is not true and reflects the failure of governments in eradicating a menace that threatens all our future generations.

Frank
December 20, 2013

Having been closer to this world long before it became this grossly violent, I’m sad for those that believe this is the way to become a type of open air mafia wise guy. I’ve seen more of this type of degradation in & around my own relatives and was not impressed with arrogant ego fueled men and women. There is never a happy end to this lifestyle. I have no answer for this, I just got out of the way. THX.

nena
December 20, 2013

To me this is very interesting…i woul love to see this film!!!!!! Thanks for sharing.

Ted
December 20, 2013

is times to are world know you need to be hard on crime like Iran do hanging criminals on street and strange for me to know. Why some human right organizations and U.N nations do not like Iran to punish criminals and they call Iran as dangers for journalist or a place to have freedom of speech , which is not true after in 2013 I travel in Iran for photography .